The chef de cuisine at Chuck Hughes’ popular Montreal restaurant, Le Bremner, won Monday’s challenge on Monday’s Top Chef Canada, winning $10,000.

The assignment was to create “Canada’s next national dish” and Smiles won with his Coast to Coast Roll — a Shrimp and Crab Roll with Maple Bacon and House-Smoked BBQ Chips.

“You want to win them all but this one I really wanted to win because it represented Canada,” Smiles told the Star. “Before they announced who was in the top three that day I was really nervous. Nearly everyone else had done a meat dish and I did seafood, so when they called my name I was just so relieved and when I was awarded winner of ‘Canada’s Next National Dish,’ I couldn’t believe it.”

The 27-year-old Smiles started work as a dishwasher at his parents’ small hotel in his native Montreal, realized he wanted to get the dishes dirty rather than clean them and embarked on a field of culinary studies in Montreal and Italy.

Returning to Canada, he was taken under Hughes’s wing and soon became the chef de cuisine at superstar chef’s second restaurant, Le Bremner, which is devoted to seafood.

“I have always been excited to work with fish and the focus at Le Bremner is decidedly aquatic,” he says.

This program marked the halfway point of Top Chef Canada’s Season 3. Smiles says the experience so far has been a roller-coaster ride.

“Being on Top Chef Canada has been amazing, but it has also been mentally exhausting …. you never know if you are going to be going home the next day.”

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